Footballers are locked away and get so insular FORMER ENGLAND FOOTBALLER
When Murphy met Goughie in battle of sports
CRICKET legend Darren Gough and former Liverpool footballer Danny Murphy both represented England. Here, they give each other a special insight into their chosen sports and debate the great divide.
MURPHY:
Cricket wasn’t big for me growing up, Goughie. The only kids in Chester who played were from the private King’s School. Cricketers seemed better educated and more articulate. It was a stereotype I had. My brothers played football ... that’s my game. GOUGH:
Football was my first sporting love too, growing up in Yorkshire. I went to camps and won holidays for my family by being chosen the best player. School cricket in Monk Bretton was a concrete pitch. I had talent but everyone thought I’d be a footballer. I couldn’t get into Yorkshire Schools cricket at 15 because of my background, where I came from. The captain batted at seven and didn’t bowl but was picked because he went to the right school. Cricket had a snob factor.
It was more ability-based as you got older. I was on a YTS at Rotherham United when I took eight for 13 for Yorkshire Under19s. Yorkshire offered me a contract and that was it. MURPHY:
You need t al ent besides hard work, and luck to be spotted by the right people. Dario Gradi gave me a chance at Crewe to pull away from outside influences and become a professional. GOUGH:
My mentor was [coach] Steve Oldham. He saw me in the nets at 16 and was an influence for the rest of my career. I still speak to him. He taught me the differences between football and cricket on my first day at Yorkshire when I turned up with a Glenn Hoddle perm and earring, straight from the Rotherham dressing room.
First thing he did was send me to the hairdresser. I’d never had short hair before, they called me Dr Spock at school. Steve kept an eye on me. He’d come in the pub and literally drag me out. MURPHY:
How did you find a cricket dressing room compared to a group of footballers?
GOUGH:
I once turned up at Rotherham with a pair of Barnsley shorts in my bag. They got burnt in the dressing room. The centre-forward Carl Airey lived 300 yards from me. I had to get three buses to training but he still wouldn’t give me a lift. I had to earn my stripes first.
The footballers were more like me, cricket was a different world. One of the young players at Yorkshire, Paul Grayson, was a posher kid from Bedale and probably looked down on me at first. He called me Pit Boy, which is sensitive where I came from. I kicked him downstairs, grabbed him by the neck and threatened to sort him. We became best mates and ended up sharing digs.
There were a lot of private school boys in cricket and still are, even in the current England team. My boys went to Stowe School, one of the best in the country, who regularly turn out county players. If you go for a trial and say you’re from Stowe or Eton or Oundle, it makes a difference. MURPHY:
When I was 12 or 13, if you wanted a game of cricket, you had to make the stumps and struggled to find a flat bit of grass. If you bunked on to a cricket ground, you had to be on your toes. I saw it as a sport for the privileged. GOUGH:
The ECB are trying to make the game more accessible, putting money into grassroots. It’s all about All Stars cricket for youngsters and the World Cup win was massive. But there is still a lack of pitches. A lot of the northwest cricketers went to schools like Manchester Grammar, such as Mike Atherton. There are loads of private schools in Yorkshire.
MURPHY:
Cricketers spend months away from home. Footballers don’t travel as long and get all the gaming rooms laid on. I do think modern players are given too much, too soon. GOUGH:
They are spoilt in that respect, mate. Footballers have always been in a different league financially. As cricketers, we got used to being away early on. I missed the birth of my first child because I was playing the first Test in Brisbane. I didn’t see Liam until nine weeks and it would have been longer if I hadn’t been injured in the third Test. We have more freedom than footballers, though. We are allowed to go out, even in Australia or India where you get recognised. You’re trusted to go to a restaurant, have a beer or share a bottle of wine.
In football, because they are ri diculously l ocked up, t hey become insular. They can’t go out so they become this group sitting around in flip-flops. MURPHY:
Our perception was we were fitter than you, cricketers could have a few the night before and still be man of the match, unless you were a fast bowler putting in the miles. That’s how we saw it. Managers like Fabio Capello became notorious, ‘Don’t do this, don’t eat that, go to bed at this time’ but not all managers were the same. Sven Goran Eriksson would let you go off and say, ‘See you at breakfast tomorrow’. One manager on an overseas trip told us not to go to bars or clubs but said it would be OK to have female company at the hotel.
Plenty of cricketers have had mental health problems and I assume it’s built over years of being away and having to deal with that isolation. Footballers have learned from cricketers to speak up if there is a problem. People think a tour of Barbados or football tournament sounds amazing but don’t see the effect it can have. You missed the birth of a child, for goodness sake. GOUGH:
Spot on mate. A high percentage of cricketers suffer on tour. Not doing well on the pitch makes it even harder. We’ve had to tour with SAS troops, high security. There were bombs in Sri Lanka which meant we were locked in.
We were the last England team to tour Pakistan in 2000 and I became more bonded with my team-mates because we couldn’t go out. We were sponsored by Carlsberg and somehow beers got to us. We filled in medical forms saying we were alcoholics because they had dispensation to drink. It turned out to be a great tour. Morale was good, the hotels and the people were lovely. It’s a bit different now. I went to New Zealand last winter as bowling coach. I’d be in the bar and not see a player unless they were walking to the gym or swimming pool. Stuart Broad and Ben Stokes bought a PlayStation because it was the best way of getting to know Jofra Archer, chatting on the headphones, playing games. MURPHY:
Management has to be clever. The first overseas trip I made was the Under-20s World Cup in Malaysia and team-mates like Jody Morris, Jason Euell, Jamie Carragher and Michael Owen are still mates today. Friendships based on going out for a bevvy, talking, laughing. But some players isolate because they are worried fame will bring hassle. GOUGH:
England set up quiz nights where current players and staff are put into teams with previous generations like myself and Gladstone Small. It’s brilliant. They asked me and Mark Butcher to go into the dressing room after they won the series in South Africa last winter. I promise you mate, it brought back memories.
It is a weird set-up where I am commentating on matches and also helping the England bowlers but it’s so important to keep that contact between different eras, what it means to wear the cap. MURPHY:
You’re coming up to 50. You’ve always been a man of many talents Goughie, bowling, batting, football, Strictly Come Dancing winner. GOUGH:
I like a challenge and I’m taking part in a Ride for Heroes celebrity bike race on Sky this evening. Olly Murs is in it, Kevin Pietersen, who got me involved, Chris Froome. We’ll be at home on static bikes, given staggered starts. Froome goes off last and tries to catch us.
I’m the oldest and going off near the front which makes it worse, being chased. Takes me back to my childhood, every weekend a scrap running away from someone! I’ve done Ride London. I did a mountain leg of t he Tour de France which was a killer, never
again. MURPHY:
Outside my window, I can see Box Hill where they did the 2012 Olympic road race. I’m happy to look rather than ride up it. Football’ s my game!